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After a long layoff due to a knee injury and some work hours issues I am ready to return to training. During this time off I seem to have developed a fear of Ukemi.I have not been able to get up the nerve to even attempt a simple forward roll.
Has anyone else ever had this happen or even heard of it before?

Absolutely... trained with my wife on the weekend after her five year layoff of Aikido (children, work commitments, etc.) and I found that almost every time I tried to throw her she resisted with every ounce of strength rather than trying to roll.

Talking to her about the training I think it came down to a lack of confidence in her ability to receive - not unreasonable given the time off the mat.

I wouldn't discount you subconciously wanting to protect your knee injury either. I've found my ukemi being askew post injury as you tend to favour the uninjured limb.

I'd give it some time, work up to it slowly and try to regain your confidence. I believe ukemi is like learning to ride a bike, it will come back of its own accord but you shouldn't expect to ride a pelaton after time off

Many of us who return to training after injury have fears to deal with as part of it.
Most of us with time and patience come back just fine.
Sometimes there may be residual. Many years after my knee injury and surgery, I still have nights when I seem incapable of doing forward rolls on one side - simply "balk" like a horse at a jump and cannot for the life of me do it so have to turn them into back falls.
But I believe I'm a weird outlier on that one.... just be patient with yourself.

I am going to recommend a different course of action. Assuming your body is sound... This is a mental barrier.

You need to just do it.

Go out there do some forward and backward rolls on your own, then find the guy you feel most comfortable being thrown by and take a fall for every throw from whatever set up feels best to you.

These are skills that you have already learned. There is no need to prolong this process if you are physically capable of doing them.

"Aikido can be summed up like this: True victory is self-victory; let that day arrive quickly! "True victory" means unflinching courage; "self-victory" symbolizes unflagging effort; and "let that day arrive quickly" represents the glorious moment of triumph in the here and now." -- Morihei Ueshiba

-Michael
"Through aiki we can feel the mind of the enemy who comes to attack and are thus able to respond immediately." - M. Mochizuki

I haven'y done proper ukemi in 4 years, went out into the snow this last winter with the kids and was doing ukemi all over the place in the field near by, great fun!! The kids think I'm a right nanna, but I didn't give a toss.....
Just go for it Dave!! you'll be alright

Janet Rosen's concept of a horse balking at the jump is exactly how I would describe the feeling. I get right to the point of going and back away. I have an odd feeling that if I could just get the first one out of the way I would be fine.

How are you doing the rolls solo to warm up? Are you starting from standing and then leaning forward with your arm curved for a forward roll? Or can you crouch and roll forward from close to the ground, or roll from kneeling? Please let me know what you have tried and what works.... I want to get back in practice too!

Or are you taking nage's lead to roll, rather than warming up with solo rolls?

Dear Dave,
I was posting and missed your answer. Your problem sounds exactly like mine, except I have an additional back problem, but I think I can try careful rolls.

Depending on your knee, you may be able to do the rolls from bending lower by calculating which knee to land on, in the case of a forward roll. I taught at a Y, so in my students' case it was the unfamiliarity. I gave the rolls nicknames, like baby rolls and egg rolls to get the concept of roundness to them, to get them to loosen up with familiar images.

But with a knee injury you need to consider the landing. Rolling on only one side is a start, then you can work into rolling on the "off " side...

Maybe someone will post with more of the mechanics of this, it's a lotta years ago for me. But I will try it myself and let you know.
thanks for sharing and good luck.

don't think of ukemi. at home, find some open spot on the floor or go out in the grass. sit flat on the ground/floor. roll back and forth like a monkey for awhile. don't even get higher than sit on the floor. do that for a week. then the next week, go up to knee or sitting squat with your butt close to the ground. then increase the height a hand span every week. soon, you will be rolling around like a monkey in no time.

sometimes i roll around my living room, around the funiture, over the funitures, kids, and so on as a game. i think i got infected by those crazy systema buggers.

"Just do it" is sometimes the right medicine, but not here, I think -- not with a technique that you're apprehensive about and that has good potential for injury if done incorrectly. What you want is a progression such as Phi describes -- progression, and patience.

I think the "monkey rolling" is particularly helpful. The way that I've done this is to sit with your legs in front of you. Your legs are bent, with your knees falling to the outside, but they're active -- they're not just dead weight. Your feet are aligned with your center line, more or less, the outside edges of your feet are touching the floor, and one foot is closer to you than the other (pretty much one behind the other). Keep your arms in and your hands close -- as if you were standing in hanmi, if that helps; if not, just keep them close and quiet.

Think about the shape described by your legs and hips as a circle. Now, starting with the foot that is closest to you, gently push off with that foot and roll around the circle -- if it's your right foot, roll from your right hip across to the left hip, down the left leg, back across to the right and back up. You should be moving sort of like a weeble in circles across the floor. Change direction, go back and forth. This gets some of the most important "rolling muscles" used to doing what they need to.

When that exercise is comfortable, start the same way, but instead of rolling around on the circle of your legs, roll up onto your back a little ways. Push off with the right foot, roll up the right hip, but now instead of rolling over to the left hip, roll up onto your back a little ways as if you were drawing a line to your left shoulder. Feel the diagonal across your back. Only go as far as you feel comfortable with. Eventually, you'll find yourself naturally rolling all the way over that left shoulder...but don't rush it. Patience, progression. There's no point in pushing limits if you're already apprehensive -- in that state, by definition, your limits have already been pushed. It's time to try another tactic.

Great! Thanks, Mary, I was posting and didn't see your post until afterwards. This will mean so much to me to be able to roll again after so many years. I really appreciate the step by step approach with all the detail and description. I really did have a mental block, but also couldn't remember the exercise from so many years ago in judo class at Cornell. Also, yours gives a transition from the circular side to side and around and then to back roll....

I'm so excited I'm answering right away, but I know the details are in there, I just skimmed the post with a real Eureka! feeling ...

If you ever were a girl scout, this was a giant good deed you just did.

Tony, what is a right nanna? Did it mean the kids thought you had lost your mind?

I feel so stupid, with all the snow we had this winter, I could have gotten back into ukemi!

You have it Dianne nanna being short for banana brains.....
Nice and soft, slipping and sliding all over the place. I actually did a real ukemi unexpectedly when I went legs right up in the air on some ice, just like a banana type backward fall, of course everyone was in stitches!!
Bear it in mind that once you have done thousands upon thousands of ukemi, it's a bit like riding a bike, you might get a bit rusty but you never forget.....

Now that rang a bell. Thanks Phi. By the way, in Asian Zodiac, I'm the year of the monkey, but 1944 so old I forgot about ukemi from the ground up so thanks for reminding me.

And finally no snow on the ground and the grass is growing fine now.

Hope this "from the ground up" method works for Dave too!

You might get away with it on the grass, only trouble is makes your clothes go green, so make sure you wear some old clothes and you'll be fine, oh yeah just clear any stones or hard bits that may be lurking there.....

Tony, what is a right nanna? Did it mean the kids thought you had lost your mind?

I feel so stupid, with all the snow we had this winter, I could have gotten back into ukemi!

Dear Diana,
A right nanna-roughly translated means someone who is a bit stupid , a bit dull, an idiot in .Not literally stupid , but acts a bit stupid.Sometimes also called a bit of a berk.Berk meaning the same.

Berk, plonker, nanna , numbskull, nutter are all phrases which can be used under certain circumstance to express the view that someone is a bit stupid in actions.In Tonys example his kids thought him a bet daft because he kept falling in the snow.In their eyes he was a bit of a nanna.
Cheers, Joe.

You might get away with it on the grass, only trouble is makes your clothes go green, so make sure you wear some old clothes and you'll be fine, oh yeah just clear any stones or hard bits that may be lurking there.....

Yeesh, how could I forget. In the previously-described "monkey rolling", the arms do get involved -- but I find it more helpful to not think too much about trying to do something with them, at least at first. As you start rolling around in a circle, they will naturally slap as you roll up on one side, and then slap on the other side as you roll over. If you find that they are getting too spread out, or that you're reaching for the floor, just bring 'em back to center and start again.

Practicing not reaching also helps when you end up doing the roll all the way over -- your arms will be in the right place, in the center, to give you the last push to a kneeling position.

don't think of ukemi. at home, find some open spot on the floor or go out in the grass. sit flat on the ground/floor. roll back and forth like a monkey for awhile. don't even get higher than sit on the floor. do that for a week. then the next week, go up to knee or sitting squat with your butt close to the ground. then increase the height a hand span every week. soon, you will be rolling around like a monkey in no time.

sometimes i roll around my living room, around the funiture, over the funitures, kids, and so on as a game. i think i got infected by those crazy systema buggers.

My wife Catherine keeps saying what are you doing you stupid old fool, can't you do that somewhere else?.....
I keep doing it as I have a crook back from taking too much of a hammering in the past, it helps to stop it seizing up.....

Dear Diana,
A right nanna-roughly translated means someone who is a bit stupid , a bit dull, an idiot in .Not literally stupid , but acts a bit stupid.Sometimes also called a bit of a berk.Berk meaning the same.
Berk, plonker, nanna , numbskull, nutter are all phrases which can be used under certain circumstance to express the view that someone is a bit stupid in actions.In Tonys example his kids thought him a bet daft because he kept falling in the snow.In their eyes he was a bit of a nanna.
Cheers, Joe.

Hi Joe

Actually, 'Berk' is term that is commonly used in this way in the UK, however it is being misused. It is a shortened bit of cockney rhyming slang that is derived from The Berkley Hunt. I'll leave you all to do the rhyming. So not a good phrase to use, but most people remain completely unaware of what they are calling someone. Tony may be a bit of a nanna, but I wouldn't call him a berk unless I had good reason to